Transgender punk singer on tour

Euronews

‘Transgender Dysphoria Blues’ is the sixth studio album by punk band Against Me!.

The album deals with gender dysphoria following the coming out of lead singer Laura Jane Grace.

“It’s pretty self-explanatory. I’m a person who’s going through gender transition and for me a lot of the record was written leading up to the decision to embrace that and to go public with that, both in my private life and in my public life. So a lot of the record’s about that,” she says.

The album tells the fictional story of a transgender prostitute, but the lyrics and the album’s message are very personal for Grace who formed the band in 1997 when she was a man named Tom Gabel.

“Right now it’s kind of like being spit out at the other end of a tornado or something like that. But it’s liberating, you know? This isn’t the first time on an Against Me! record that I’ve written songs dealing with those feelings, but it’s the first time that I feel I’m able to be interpreted correctly or able to be taken from the correct perspective,” says the singer.

The band is currently touring the US to promote its album.

Laura Jane Grace makes no apologies for singing of her dysphoria bluntly and viscerally, and that is what fans like.